The "liberal solution" to America's conflict with the Islamic world, Dinesh D'Souza argues, is doomed from the outset because it imagines that American political values may be absolutely abstracted from its cultural values. Most Americans, according to D'Souza, have cultural beliefs that give them much more in common with the "family values" of Islamic culture, than that of the cultural Left.
The Enemy At Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11
by Dinesh D'Souza
published by Broadway (February 12, 2008)
Ppbk., 384 pgs.
ISBN-10: 0767915615
ISBN-13: 978-0767915618
In his 2008 book The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and its Responsibility for 9/11, Dinish D'Souza argues forcefully that America is perceived from abroad, not for the abstract promise associated with democracy, but through its aggressive cultural imperialism. Since the 1960s conservatives and traditional liberals have naively believed that America's reputation is associated with the outcome of its political process. This, D'Souza argues, is delusional. Since the 1960s, power in American society has been increasingly exercised by forces unregulated by the political process: the courts and the media. In these areas, the cultural Left has eviscerated conservatives, advancing "an agenda of libertine and elitist policies" (concealed in the rhetoric of "human rights" or "individual rights") which have engendered fear and anger towards America in much of the non-European world. Conservatives must realize, D'Souza argues, that their greatest opponent in the modern world is not, for example, Islamic culture (with which it has much in common): it lies with the cultural Left, whose unrelenting, savage attacks on the cultural institution of the family has fueled much of the world's animosity.
D'Souza's claim that culture plays an increasingly greater role in American life than politics and even international relations is hardly new. Francis Fukuyama, in his influential The End of History and the Last Man, argued that with the demise of Soviet communism, significant political differences between nations came to an end. Liberal democracy, proving triumphant, became the only political alternative. This would not mean, however, that conflicts between nation states would cease to exist. In his equally influential The Clash of Civilizations, Samuel Huntington took Fukuyama's thesis a step further. Huntington argued that conflicts in the 21st century would be characterized increasingly by cultural disputes rather than political ones. In contemporary academia, an entire subgenre of the humanities, known as historicism, is premised on the notion that the exercise of power is never confined to what is traditionally thought to be politics. Power is a "microphysics," a constituent part of everyday life.
What is the nature of this "left culture" which, D'Souza believes, has so inflamed the Islamic world? D'Souza's answer is unsurprising to conservatives: "The Bohemian culture of the 1960s." And while D'Souza associates "Bohemian culture" with the usual sexual excesses, he also means something specific by it: As the basis of "liberal morality, Bohemian culture is premised on the belief that right and wrong reside not in some eternal order but within the inner reaches of our own heart." This "ethic of individual autonomy" pits the Left against communitarian values, the nuclear family, and those places where the state has adopted cultural values as its own (such as the heterosexual family unit). For this reason the cultural Left is feverishly obsessed with issues such as contraception, abortion, the right to bear children out of wedlock, or the rights of children against corporal punishment. The cultural Left opposes any legislative effort that might enhance the authority of the family.
D'Souza's main point appears to be a simple one — even a nasty one: while the Left remains committed to a very specific, sexually libertine agenda, it is rarely explicit about this. Instead, it conceals its objectives in grandiose and misleading terms such as "freedom of speech." For example, D'Souza cites the ACLU's defense of Larry Flint. But while the ACLU couched their defense of Flint in the language of "freedom of speech," in fact their defense could hardly be distinguished from the right to "exploit women for the sexual gratification of men." The slogan of "diversity," too, is frequently deployed by liberals, less to defend minority cultures (which often find themselves at odds with libertine liberal morality), but as a guise for advancing some ulterior agenda (usually sexual license, criticism of which is equated with racism). "Conservatives uphold the law in order to preserve their cultural values, the leftist does the same thing — only his or her values are radically different," D'Souza argues. This duplicity is because the cultural Left is "blind to the moral concerns of traditional people . . . [They have no] concern for childhood innocence and modesty, because [they] do not share the traditional view of right or wrong."
D'Souza's willingness to attack the motives of the cultural Left might easily be seen as a sort of "Jacobinism." The abstract language of politics is usually a way in which disputes between groups and individuals avoid making conflict "personal." Unfortunately, as D'Souza implies, after 9/11 Americans can no longer avoid talking about the cultural effects of its political rhetoric.
Globalization, the internet, television and America's economic clout conspire to make America's cultural affairs world affairs — whether other nations wish for this or not. And pretending that defending the sexual exploitation of women may be rationalized (or even morally justified) under the political ideal of "free speech" is a distinction America's enemies don't bother to make. The hostility the ayatollahs and Bin Laden have towards the West has little to do with democracy — as the cultural Left patronizingly insists. It has to do with America's exporting of libertine values.
The cultural Left has been assiduous in using the federal courts and the media to impose its beliefs on Americans. However, it has been equally effective in wresting control of international institutions such as the UN or Planned Parenthood in order to advance its agenda worldwide. Here, the cultural Left's international strategy has been the same as at home. While domestically, the Left concealed its libertine agenda under the guise of "freedom of speech" or "individual rights," internationally, the Left concealed its efforts under the slogan "human rights." Both are euphemisms, of course, rhetorical justifications for imposing the Left's western prejudices without subjecting them to public scrutiny. It is ironic, D'Souza writes, that "the Left is accusing President Bush of "imperialism," when it is precisely its values which most Muslims find most offensive."
Part of the reason the Islamic world is quick to equate America (and its political system) with the excesses of American popular culture is that the Western distinction between public and private doesn't exist elsewhere. Islamic states, D'Souza argues, "do not accept the public/secular vs. private distinction common to American and European countries." Since America's presence in these countries is mainly from television, "the average Muslim living in Saudi Arabia or Indonesia, when he or she thinks of America, thinks of sleazy talk shows hosted by the likes of Jerry Springer, Geraldo Rivera or Maury Popovich."
Moreover, religion, the foundation of Islamic societies, is constantly subject to ridicule in the American media. Whatever the American constitution may say about religion, in American popular culture religious values are routinely ridiculed. In American movies. . .1
. . . prudish characters are ridiculed and subject to jokes. Homosexuals are always presented as good looking and charming and adultery is glorified. Prostitutes are always portrayed more favorably and decently than anyone who criticizes them. Small towns are the preferred venue for evil and scary occurrences, and country pastors are usually portrayed as vicious, hypocritical , sexually repressed and corrupt . . . Religion is simply not a feature in the lives of movie and television characters. Lots of film and TV characters have premarital sex, but very rarely does anyone contract a sexually transmitted disease. "Prudes" are always the subject of jokes and ridicule . . .
Where are the "moral standards," D'Souza asks, in American popular culture? As the Muslims allege, D'Souza writes, there are none.
The "liberal solution" to America's conflict with the Islamic world, D'Souza argues, is doomed from the outset because it imagines that American political values may be absolutely abstracted from its cultural values. In this way the cultural Left's vision of the world betrays a cultural chauvinism which blinds it to why it is hated. Washington Senator Patty Murray, for instance, declared that Bin Laden's popularity came from his contributions to "building programs." Murray first conveniently attributes Muslim affection for Bin Laden as having nothing to do with what he or they actually say (endless denunciations of western decadence). She then attributes to Bin Laden and those who follow him motives which resemble her own. By providing Muslims with certain public projects, Murray turns Bin Laden into "a sort of private form of tax relief." Murray implicitly denies that the values she stands for are in fact the real threat to the Islamic world.
Murray, when forced to provide an explanation for Muslim hatred of America, must argue that it comes from simple ignorance of value-free-democracy. D'Souza responds sharply: "The problems the Islamic world has with America today are not from 'ignorance' of democracy.2 The problems come from 'too much familiarity' with America's culture." There is indeed a crusade against the Muslim world — it is a modern day crusade of liberal values being forced upon Muslims. The "liberal solution" to the West's conflict with the Islamic world is guaranteed to enrage Muslims further. The "export of democracy" will be unsuccessful if "democracy" continues to mean the forceful imposition of "Hollywood values" on "liberated" countries.
The most interesting part of D'Souza's book is his conclusion. Most Americans, he argues, have cultural beliefs that give them much more in common with the "family values" of Islamic culture, than that of the cultural Left. In fact, the cultural Left and radical Islam have a great deal in common: namely, that they loathe American society and wish for its destruction. To regain the trust of the rest of the world, Americans and American conservatives in particular, need to reaffirm their own cultural values, which link them to the international community.
American conservatives have too hastily cut themselves off from the international community by naively insisting on the idea of "One America," or even "common western heritage." Americans — and particularly conservatives — have dangerously sought to contextualize the extremist views of the cultural Left under the thin guise of a common political rhetoric.3 They have failed miserably, D'Souza says, and in the process have absorbed the hatred that should be directed at the cultural Left.4
D'Souza concludes by outlining his solution to the West's confrontation with the Islamic world. First, it needs to identify the proper enemy, which is not the conservative Muslim world, but the cultural Left. It should "stop this ridiculous preening as the champions of secularism" and should "prevent the cultural Left from exporting bogus rights and cultural debauchery." This means, "giving up on leftists in America and Europe who will never join our side." Conservatives must "find common cause with the traditional Muslims who share many of our values and can help us defeat radical Islam." Given America's failure to find a military solution to its "Islamic problem," these traditional Muslims are the "only ones who can help us find a solution to Islamic radicalism."
At face value, D'Souza's book purports to prove that the cultural Left somehow inspired the Jihadist attack on America on 9/11. In this it fails. D'Souza offers no believable causal evidence that American popular culture was the inspiration for the 19 lunatics who flew two planes into the Twin Towers. In fact, D'Souza doesn't even examine western academic culture, whose simplistic "good vs. bad" attitude towards Islam in the 1990s (generally, Islam is "good" and "oppressed" by "bad" America) has been written about by Martin Kramer in his Ivory Towers in the Sand.5 Bin Laden and the well educated radicals surrounding him were more likely motivated by these ideas than revulsion at what they might have seen on American television.6
There are other reasons The Enemy at Home proves frustrating. First, D'Souza's "cultural Left" is drawn from a rogues gallery that is of almost no influence whatsoever on American politics at home or abroad. While Noam Chomsky has a cult following of sorts among urban yuppies, few outside of academia have ever heard of him. The same is true of Arundhati Roy or Gore Vidal. Eve Ensler's Vagina Monologues perhaps scandalized members of the university, but I seriously doubt it was spicy enough to get a single internet porn-addict to exchange web surfing for images for "textual pleasure." Second, D'Souza's claim that the far Left somehow has a monopoly over extreme individualism is unconvincing: surely Timothy McVeigh and his friends were as unsociable as anyone on the far Left. Individualism is neither left nor right: it's American. Third, the content of American television seems to be enjoyed by red staters nearly as much (if not more than!) as blue staters. Soulless Hollywood is indeed precisely that: it's about making money. And while Left and Right are generally unhappy with what they see, the balance of television programming appeals to the "soulless center," which, in the end, remains the largest paying audience. Finally, D'Souza ignores the "class" perspective which explains what drives much of "decadent culture": Walter Benn Michaels in his The Trouble with Diversity links the American cultural obsession with race and gender to middle class opportunism.
However, for all its weaknesses, D'Souza's book speaks convincingly to contemporary society when he argues that "culture" is not simply what takes place in private space, but is today the driving force in modern American society. It hardly requires proof to assert that more Americans (and non-Americans) are familiar with the heroes of popular culture than the president — and many of those who know about the president know him through pop culture sources. It is simply naive to assume that popular culture — with its values — somehow remains apart from "the political sphere." In any case, it no longer matters. D'Souza argues that America is part of a global community and it ignores the effects its cultural values have on others — even those couched in "freedom of speech" — at its own peril.
D'Souza's speculation on the motivations behind the Left's defense of free speech will no doubt earn him criticism. However, in the new global community where cultural and political values are increasingly blurred together, the genealogy of political discourse can hardly be stuffed back into the old "public/private" bottle. D'Souza only states the obvious when he notes that liberals, while willing to defend pornography under the name of free speech, are nowhere to be found when it comes to defending the equivalent rights for Christians.7 Their selective defense of multiculturalism, generally when it challenges Christianity or furthers the cause of some exotic form of sexuality, can hardly be assumed to be "disinterested." To recognize this is to acknowledge America's place in the world's community. It is to acknowledge that American political intentions can no longer be visited upon the rest of the world without acknowledging America's cultural responsibility.
The Enemy At Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11 is available on Amazon.com.
Endnotes
1. The Left's attacks on the family in the Hollywood media are not without foundation. With a divorce rate of fifty percent, one-third of American children living apart from their biological father, 30 million abortions annually, and most women unable to be with their children because of the necessity to work, "the very concept of the family no longer really exists in the West."
2. D'Souza points out that Islamacists have no problem with democracy — in Algeria and among the Palestinians, religious extremists fully supported democracy as a means of taking power!
3. Another way this comes about is when conservatives insist that liberals are simply "naive" about the danger of Islamic terrorism — needing to be "more fully educated." This is a way of saying that liberals "really would be conservatives" if they were just smarter. This both denies liberals the right to actually believe in what they claim they do — and rationalizes their attacks on the family by insisting that it is really a "misguided application of ratinoal political language." Leftists such as Richard Falk or the New York Times, D'Souza argues, had no problem defending the Ayatollah against the Shah of Iran. Likewise, you never hear the Left clamoring for democracy in Iran or Syria. The reason is because their motivation is to oppose Bush . . .
4. Today, the "One America" rhetoric prevents Americans from even diagnosing the roots of Islamic hostility correctly. What offended Muslim men from the Abu Ghraib prison scandal (prisons in the Islamic world are notorious), D'Souza argued, was the sight of Muslim men being humiliated by American women. However, nothing was written about this in the New York Times, which cloaked the incident in the rhetoric of "human rights abuse." Even George Bush went along with this.
5. Martin Kramer, Ivory Towers in the Sand: The Failure of Middle Eastern Studies in America (Washington Institute for Near East Policy, 2001).
6. Several of the hijackers reportedly visited prostitutes before commencing with the attack on the Trade Towers.
7. Or even rock music, as Tipper Gore discovered.
Nathan,
Good reporting, but …
You repeatedly stressed the cause of Muslim animus toward America is our hedonist culture. Your object here seems to be proving (to Muslims) it isn’t true, that most of us are decent, un-hedonistic folks; and not, therefore, culturally threatening. Either that or that it is only true at the margins of our society, that these ‘hedonists’ are corrupting us, and that your persuasion is for those of us who have not yet succumbed to the dark-side. Either way (and however valid the points individually) you have made the one dependent on the other while resting the whole on a debatable foundation (i.e., Muslim animus).
You argued mainly by reference to the D’Sousa-Murray debate, neither of whom mentions the possibility Muslim cultural hostility predates and is independent of American culture, politics, and mores. Both these gentlemen, also and equally, ignore these specific hatreds and their supposed causes have a chicken-&-egg quality to them: Did Hollywood cultural values cause a righteous Muslim indignation or did Muslims find in Hollywood cultural-values a convenient rationale for an already festering indignation in search of a root cause? Other traditional societies find fault in American hedonism, to be sure; but none are so culturally indignant as jihadists fixated on our folly as cause to wipe us out. Therefore, something else is going on and, however real the Muslim dislike of our culture, the fixation is being exploited as justification for a hostility toward other cultures that is mostly (if not entirely) internal to Islam.
I don’t know anything about Mr. Murray, but Dinesh D’Sousa is a sharp guy and I am surprised he would resort to ‘blame-the-victim’ type reasoning (if, in fact, that was his reasoning). Yet, I have read him elsewhere argue convincingly Muslim animus for all things non-Muslim is rooted in Islam itself. He has an Indian (Hindu) background, from which he draws first-hand that Muslim animus is not limited to the West or Western culture(s); that Indian culture has been subjected to Islamic vilification and aggression even more and for longer than the West. Why Indian culture more than Western culture? Because in the Islamic scheme of things, Christianity and Judaism are at least nominally legitimate (Mohammed gave his religion a Judeo-Christian starting point). Jihadist attacks against pagans over the centuries gave little quarter, with surrender normally resulting in massacre. Pagans were generally given but two choices: convert or die. Jewish and Christian monotheists, by way of contrast, were given three choices: a) convert to Islam, b) cling to our flawed and despised beliefs under Muslim domination, or c) die. When after three and a half centuries of Muslim attack, Christianity learned to fight back, Islam looked elsewhere for easier pickings; obliging us with a respite; but, only until their ‘pagan problem’ was dealt with. Faced with Indian resistance, on the otherhand, Muslim efforts to batter through were often redoubled. This relenting in the West while redoubling in the East can only be understood in the context of a greater Muslim hatred of paganism as compared to the bare tolerance Islam has of rival monotheisms; a tolerance that has worn thin with the modern rise of the West in relation to Islam. The Asian continent east of the Hindu Kush has few natural defenses. It was also a rich source of plunder whereas Europe (other than Constantinople) prior to 1400 was too poor to attract Islam’s need to finance itself as it grew. This has been the situation right up to modern times. So, you can see why I’d find it unlikely D’Sousa, an Indian-American, would think our lax morals are principally causing this hatred.
You make the argument the jihadist reviling us are unaware of the distinctions between our liberal-hedonist over-representation and the solid, conservative culture on which our society depends for its stability. My understanding of the jihadist networks is they are populated mainly by a cross-section of Muslim society lead by educated elite. Their fatwas and propaganda make clear they are not fooled by the Hollywood presentation of our culture, and that our complacency in allowing this hedonism merely confirms the superiority they feel for their own religion and culture. Correcting this defect, therefore, has little effect on their calculations beyond denying them useful propaganda.
Islam has been concocting resentments and battering away at neighbors since mad-mullah Mohammed first warred against rival Arabian tribes for the greater glory of his religion (read Andrew Bostom’s http://www.amazon.com/Legacy-Jihad-Islamic-Holy-Non-Muslims/dp/1591026024/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1234558532&sr=1-2 ). Islam divides the world into ‘dar al harb’ and ‘dar al Islam’ (‘harb’ is Arabic for ‘war’). Within dar-al-Islam, rules of conduct apply, but, outside this cloister, the rest of us are subjects of scorn and objects of righteous violence unprotected by Muslim mores. Islam is the only truly militant religion the world has ever seen. The first Muslim century set the pattern, and has rarely wavered from it. It has grown in sophistication, but is fundamentally the same expansionist religion it began. From its inception, ‘peaceful’ Islam has been the exception far more often than the rule; and usually that peacefulness has been an expedient dictated by weakness. There are peaceful Muslims to be sure, but it is not they who, thus far, define Islam. When unable to fight the West, Islam warred against the East (India). When not against the East, it warred against Africa. When not thrusting and enslaving in Africa, it pushed north into the -stans. Thus, there has hardly been a time it has not been thrusting and expanding somewhere. Today, using the modern means we provide it, militant-Islam is making war against almost every culture on every continent and island not yet Muslim or deemed apostate. If we Americans are the root cause of this Islam-wide animus, why then does this ‘religion of peace’ make chronic war against all others; among them peaceful Buddhists, Christian-Arabs, Gypsies, African pagans, Filipinos, Indonesians, and Asians. The real animus is against any and all resistance to Islam, the rest is convenient excuse; and, more often, turning our own efforts to understand them against us.
If Muslim resentment of us has increased in modern times and with respect to liberalism, it is principally because we represent the only effective roadblock to Islamic dominance. Liberalism, with its emphasis on freedom (however wrongly attributed to those we ourselves term ‘liberal’ when we really mean ‘socialist’) is the moral-philosophical antithesis of the Islamic theocratic doctrine almost as much as it is the ideological antithesis of socialism. As such, it is the only cogent argument we have for the opposing of both, and, therefore must be battered down if Islam is to pick up where it left off its expansion. It is resented, not because it corrupts but because it liberates. It is not our hedonism that excites their opposition, it is our emphasis on free will; be it for right or wrong.
HI Bob,
I hope I made clear what are D'Souza's points and my own!
1. D'S's point is that most Americans have cultural values similar to their own. He makes the further point that the "libertine left" has come to control the media and international institutions which create an image of America that is inaccurate and offensive to Muslims.
2. Your second point is that what motivates Muslims is their religion, which traditionally is expansionist and hostile to liberalism. YOu are arguing (I think) that it is less "western provocation" than something intrinsic to Islam that is the principal reason behind ISlams dislike of the west.
3. D'S argues against your second point and says that "Wahabi" Islam is simply a very strict form of Islam and nothing in it promotes attacks on Christians. I would add that the Koran, like the Bible, may prove a source of justification for almost anything. Both are "poetic" texts and cannot be consistently read usefully for a single "philosophy "of how to run a state, ie both at times seem to emphasize peace and at other times war.
4. I think there is a danger in overemphasizing the religious aspect (or "intellectual history") of the current conflict. Many of today's "Muslim" societies have had long periods of secular rule. D'S's suggestion that they may be motivated by certain contemporary irritants–such as American television–I find convincing.
5. D'S main point is that liberalism always "has a face" that is seen by others. While I was in downtown Seattle last night, I walked by several pornographic theaters. In D'S terms, the "face" of democracy on first and Stewart is "pornographic theaters"! Someone unfamiliar w/ America might assume this is the essence of democracy-and rightly dismiss "liberalism" on account of what he/she had seen. I think D'S is making a common sense point here. D'S. then makes another common sense point: we need to control our "face" in respect to other countries/cultures. He doesnt suggest we chuck liberalism. He does suggest that the "libertine left" has put itself in a position to project a vision of America which is inaccurate and which need not be subject to democratic criticism. D'S suggests we need to do something about this.
6. The best critique of D'S is Andrew Sullivan's "Mullah" in the New Republic. It may be read here:
http://www.powells.com/review/2007_03_15
I will write a review of Sullivan's new book, "The Conservative Soul" and his critique of D'S. in the coming weeks.
Sullivan makes the strong argument that all of what we call "culture" is essentially a domain "protected" by liberalism. To restrict any form of "cultural expression," Sullivan argues, is to do what the Mullahs/theocracies do. He is thus very hostile to D'Souza. Instead of agreeing w/ D'Souza that we need to change our image abroad, Sullivan argues that the Islamic states are backwards and that the "Muslim mind", with its fusion of secular and religious, is not sophisticated. Democracy (and accompanying pornography and what have you) need to be forced down the Islamic throat, he argues, if confrontation arises.
Nathan,
Then, all hope is lost! Dinesh has gone over to the Dark-Side!!!
In your point number one you said “Dinesh’s point is that most Americans have cultural values similar to their own.” You haven’t identified who ‘they’ are in this statement. Either that or you are saying ‘we’ have values similar to ‘our’ own, which makes no sense. Please clarify. On the assumption you are talking about ‘liberal’ Muslims, you need to be more specific than that, because not all liberal Muslims are the same, and vary as much or more in their liberalism than do ‘liberal’ Americans.
If Dinesh said of Wahhabism “… [it] is simply a very strict form of Islam and nothing in it promotes attacks on Christians”, then I have to ask what drugs was he taking (or gun to his head) at the time he said it. I really did think he understood the enemy facing us better than that. How do you know the Koran does not promote attacks on non-Muslims? Have you read it or substantial parts of it? If you did read English-language translations, how do you know you weren’t reading some version cleverly sanitized to beguile and subvert? I prefer to believe the vitriolic version, the one ‘purist’ Muslims insist is accurate (at least until someone proves them wrong), that does, indeed, promote overthrow of non-Muslim and apostate societies and giving numerous specific citations to scripture. This is the version the Arab homeboys subscribe to, as do most of the Sunni world from Morocco to the Philippines, and as do Iran's Shi'ites. It is the 'liberal' Muslim, mainly living in the West, culturally furthest from the source, and probably getting it watered down, who is the exception. Moreover, at least some of the scholars conversant in Arabic and in Muslim religious writings, history, and teachings let slip Islam has at its core a principle of expeditious overthrow of all other religions with only minimal tolerance of Christianity and Judaism (properly muzzled), and with Mohammed himself leading the charge to pillage and murder in the name of Allah. Read Andrew Bostom’s ‘The Legacy of Jihad’, Robert Spencer’s ‘Politically-Incorrect Guide to Islam’, Walid Phares’ ‘Future Jihad’, and Ibn Warreq’s ‘Why I am Not a Muslim’ if you think me inaccurate in this depiction.
As for “…there is a danger in overemphasizing the religious aspect…”, only if unfounded. If true, then the greater danger is taking the multiculturalist view all cultures (and religions) are equal and equally benign/dangerous. You are wrong in supposing Islam merely another religion, because it has always been also a code for public governance and conduct from its tribal beginnings under the strict rule of Mohammed. I see little harm in erring on the side of caution with respect to Islam, especially as the long history of Islamic aggression, scripture, theocratic rule, and mistreatment of non-Muslims (including current abuses) bears this out. In Islam, the secular and the theosophic are inseparable. When you land on a strange planet where you don’t know the rules or language and one alien offers you his appendage in friendship while another licks his chops; which do you believe the better representation of intent?
As for our porno-shops (on our own turf, mind you) being so intolerable to Muslims half a planet away, I remind you it was Muslim society that gave us the harem, the houri (aka, whore), the slave bazaar, ‘The Thousand and One Arabian Nights’, a large sexually-explicit literature, and, yes, even the pornographic postcard which evolved into our pin-up and Pet of the Month. Muslim culture and literature has long been replete with every form of fetish. So, I hardly see how we’ve been the cause of ‘their corruption’. If that’s how we’re being portrayed, then let’s not reinforce such nonsense by lending it credence.
The mistake here is not in accepting some Muslims have made the transition to or toleration of our values; it is over-generalizing from an exception that can’t be relied on as a barometer for Muslim non-support of jihadism. When jihadists flew our planes into our buildings, Muslims around the globe cheered, wept and fired guns into the air, many of them citizens of modern ‘liberal, secular’ states. In fact, a few Muslims took to our own streets to cheer. They did it with the same relish they do every time a rocket takes out an Israeli school or hospital. Those reactions were broadcast from Gaza, Tehran, Baghdad, Cairo, Istanbul, Riyadh, Beirut, Morocco, southern Philippines, Sudan, Kosovo, and Detroit; and were rebroadcast many months in the Muslim media (e.g., al Jazeera). Those, to me, are far better indicators of what was and remains a broad base of jihadist support; showing almost no remorse for what happened nor opposition to al Qaeda; preferring to distract us with our own imperfections and forcing us to apologize for having maligned Islam. I know the media has buried the footage along with the event itself, but it is indelibly imprinted in my recollection of that day. I am amazed so many others can have forgotten. We have been told to forget it, that it is wrong to ‘profile’ Muslims this way – and so we do.
Muslim countries having "long periods of secular rule" is not particularly germane to the underlying cultural values supportive of jihad and of aggressive Islamic expansionism. The America as ‘irritant’ argument, in order to be valid, ought to have had a similarly inflammatory effect on other non-Western, tradition-minded societies; which they have not other than as pale imitation. As this has been unique to Muslim societies across the whole spectrum of Muslim governance (secular to theocratic), some common factor must be in play that applies irrespective of governmental secularism. The fact Iraq had a 30+ year secularist government did not succeed in turning Iraq into a secular country. Nor were the Ba’athist largely secularists; instead being more for show. Only a handful at the top of Iraqi society were atheists in the sense we think. So, what all Muslim countries have in common is Islam, with the populations of even the most secular of Muslim nations reflecting Islamic values, aspirations, and history.
Another mistake we make is in supposing because a country is secular or socialist it is not also religious. Those countries most heavily influenced by socialist thinking under Soviet tutelage, managed to hang onto their Muslim identity; even managing to modify socialist ideology and cant to purely Muslim needs. You rarely hear Muslims (however secularized) taking offense at being called ‘Muslim’ which has but one meaning – a submissively faithful believer in Allah. The root word from which 'Islam' was derived means 'submission'. Compare this to secularists in the West who take enormous offense at being labelled 'Christian'. If there was a large secularist base in these countries, don't you think at least some of them might object to being labelled 'Muslim' (i.e., submissively superstitious)? Ibn Warraq is the lone exception I have so far found to this general rule. At no point did large numbers of Muslims abandon their self-identification principally as Muslims and only superficially became socialists. Most of them embrace socialism for its utility (something Muslims are pretty good at), while remaining faithful and giving all deference to Allah. In the West being a socialist implies 'anti-religious'; in Muslim countries, obviously, it does not.
If America and its values are such a problem, the answer is to offer or create something better, something that effectively competes with and replaces it; not hijack planes, blow up buildings, murder innocents, and forcibly subvert. If this is the ‘superior’ culture Muslims want for us, then I guess I can put up with those porno shops a little longer.
1. Oops, point one contained a typo: D'Souza's point is that average Americans have values similar to average Muslims.
2. D'Souza's point about Wahhabi Islam couldn't be clearer: he argues it's about discipline, something like Catholic asceticism. Here's his quote on page 42-43: "This may come as news to some conservatives, but Wahhabi Islam is not a breeding ground of Islamic radicalism. It is a breeding ground of Islamic obedience."
D'Souza disagrees w/ you further: "Almost all the Islamic radicals are western born." (p. 43)The average Muslim is quite different from the radical, he insists. It has been my experience that many radical Muslims may be found in places such as London and other western capitols. In fact, not too long ago, we found most of the most radical third world Marxists educated in places such as Paris!
3. YOu can find most anything in the Koran–as you can the Bible. Passages in the Koran appear to advocate violence against Jews and Christians–and then promptly contradict themselves by seeming to renounce violence. I don't have an answer for this, but in my original response to you I called the Koran (like the Bible) a "poetic" text to account for this. I think rather than label a text "violent" or not (atheists like to do this w/ the Bible), it's better perhaps to look at how the book is read. Certainly some Muslims have taken an edict of war from the Koran. Others have taken something different. One may make the same claims about Christianity.
4. As for you next point, I don' think accounting for the west's procative image abroad necessarily excludes taking into account Islam's history. But I think it would be hardly wiser to attempt to understand today's Muslim in terms of the KOran than it would be today's American in terms of the Bible. D'Souza offers a contemporary reason for the ongoing conflict between the west and Islam. I'm not sure why one cannot accept both.
5. If your point by mentioning the Arabian Nights (compared to the west's output, hardly worth mentioning, as a casual surfing of the web would no doubt make clear!) is to say the west can with good conscience wash it's hands of pornography's origins, then would it not be best to try and wash the west's hands of its current output?! I think tha'ts D'Souza's real point!
6. The strenght of D'Souza's argument (and here I find him more convincing than other places) is that what conservatives in the west have in common with the Muslim world is the institution of the family. D'Souza offers this as a bridge between cultures. He also offers the family as a sort of cultural institution that goes beyond the secular/religious dichotomy that your argument rests upon (as does the west vs. the rest argument) Your argument assumes that Muslims somehow are less interested in the family and more interested in waging fanatical jihad against the west. This, you argue, is rooted in their religious past–and somehow makes them willing to risk the destruction of their families under American bombs–for the sake of a possibly dubious interpretation of the Koran. I have no doubt there are some Muslims willing to do this. –you offer as evidence scenes from television of Muslims cheering on the 9/11 terrorists. I find D'Souza's argument more convincing.
7. If you accept D'Souza's "anthropological" argument about the family, then you have to come up w/ a reason for the "Muslim" hatred of the west. He chooses decadent wester culture–and provides ample evidence from the speeches of Muslims for this (he's weak in providing social evidence for this–though taht doesn't mean we should presume the average Muslim prefers jihad to his family).
Bob,
I'm not sure you've grasped his argument fully. Or if you have, your response is to continue to equate "liberalism" with "far left anti family" values. D'Souza suggests this need not be the case–and in any case, if we are to get along with the Muslim world, we need to do something about those who do–and take advantage of this to pursue (non dmeocratically) a far left libertine agenda.
I suspect Muslim hatred of USA to be related to decades of meddling in their internal affairs (the overthrow of Mohammed Mossadegh is a prime example), and our knee-jerk support of Israel. Simple. D'Souza's argument is disingenuous at best and partisan at worst.
Luminousball,
Here I broadly concur w/ Bob–Islamic dislike of the west goes beyond Israel and has to do w/ the fundamental political differences between the two societies: one liberal, the other (usually) a theocracy. I don't understand your final point.
WNA
However valid it may be saying Americans and middle-eastern (hereafter ME) Muslims share values in common, is immaterial to they also have values distinctly different from ours. We don’t share, for instance, the Islamic idea of total submission to Allah. This is not just religious or spiritual submission; it is submission in all things religious and political. The Muslim has not only well-defined duties to Allah, but also well-defined duties to the greater community of Muslims irrespective of borders. These duties include support for the core principle of expanding the religious base that is intrinsic to Islam; and which cannot be considered complete until the whole world is successfully brought to Allah. Thus, the Muslim who resists jihad bis saif (jihad by the sword) is as apostate as the Muslim who refuses to pay Zakat, and he who does not support it in others is failing in his faith. In this, Muslims are not free agents because Islam makes no allowance for free-will. Everything that happens is the will of Allah.
In the Judeo-Christian scheme of things, we acknowledge and venerate G-d; yet our theory of G-d includes the idea he made us free-agents that we may to come to him when ready. We may also lose our faith and wander off from G-d without violating Islam’s inflexible rule against apostasy (once in, no way out). However useful our points of commonality, any solution we find to the problem of jihad bis saif must take these uniquely Muslim values into account.
Besides the Koran, Islam also has a legal foundation of which most westerners are unaware. This legal tradition has resulted in a number of codes every Muslim must follow and a looser body of practices he is expected to follow. Together they comprise shari’a (law), and wherever a Muslim finds himself (be it in Muslim countries or not) he is expected to adhere. Moreover, Muslims fully expect host countries to allow Muslims to practice these laws (not merely a religion) within the confines of the host’s territory without respect to the host’s laws and without reciprocity. Where the Muslim population is small, there is not much pressure from Muslims to enforce shari’a, but where their numbers are large some one of them will invariable start a movement to impose it locally; and that’s when the trouble starts. The rest of the Muslim community (all 1.6 billion of them) can be counted on to lend whatever support is necessary to bring about the necessary change. Now, can you honestly say we ‘share’ this particular Muslim value of Islamic superposition? Or anything remotely like it?
However ‘clear’ D’sousa’s reasoning, it is not proof. How does he prove his thesis Wahhabism is not a breeding ground? The negative of a negative is not necessarily a positive. He is reasoning from inferences only, and not verifying them as exclusive of other possible causations. He makes no accounting for the proven involvement of Saudi Wahhabist groups found to support terrorism and spreading anti-Western doctrine in the lead up to 9/11. Saudi Arabia has been exporting the Wahhabist creed for decades, pouring billions of petro-dollars into Western mosques, madrassas, and outreach programs; and with western Muslims taking their technical training from us while getting their indoctrination, spiritual guidance, and marching orders from Riyadh. The Saudis continue that support today unabated and without giving much account of their activities. They don’t succeed in snaring every loyal Muslim this way into subverting his adopted country, but they don’t have to. If only a fraction of native Muslims take up the anti-western rant, return to the east for ‘specialized’ training, or berate fellow Muslims for slackness, it is enough. Therefore, Wahhabism has managed to bypass this seeming obstacle. Nor is Saudi Wahhabism the only conduit for this. The Muslim Brotherhood, Hamas, Hezbollah, ISF, &c also promote salafism. Many of these operate as charitable and educational organizations, including some who receive taxpayer funding in addition to Wahhabi funding operating as NGOs. Many (including the Saudi Wahhabist groups) have been caught laundering money, recruiting, disseminating propaganda, provisioning, border violations, and providing cover for anti-Western activities. So technically, no, Wahhabism isn’t the only one, but they have certainly made the biggest contribution and had the widest influence.
Actually, it should come as no surprise to anyone, conservative or otherwise, that Wahhabism is “about discipline”. All Islam is discipline. How else describe ‘submission’ if not as a form of imposed or self-discipline? Liberalism is, by its very nature, ‘undisciplined’ as it is founded on the idea each of us has free-will to decide how disciplined or undisciplined we choose to be. Islam makes no such allowance, has been expansionist from its inception, recognizes but one sovereign (Allah), and dishes out some of the severest punishments for minor infractions known to man.
What also should come as no surprise is, as you say, that most of the ‘radical Muslim behavior’ is found here in the West. But, from this Dinesh has drawn a false conclusion. This same behavior, if acted out in a Muslim country, would be quickly suppressed. The only radical behavior tolerated in Muslim countries is anti-Western behavior. But, that is not the same as saying these Muslim radicals who act so awful here in the west do so because they are somehow different from or more radicalized than their ME brothers or have been made radical by exposure to us. Some of that is true, but not all. Mainly, they share the same underlying philosophy and intolerance as their ME brethren. The ME brothers are already immersed in the ‘approved culture’; and, therefore, have no reason to rebel, and would be suppressed in any case. The Western-residing Muslim, on the other hand, is encouraged act up; the better to ignite changes in the host country satisfactory to Islam’s objective of expanding the circle of faith. When he does, he gets immediate political backing from the mother-ship; as we saw in the case of 9/11, the London subway bombings, the Madrid train bombings, the imposition of French laws to Muslim ghettos, the Mohammed caricatures, and every other case in which Muslims react violently to hosts.
The only place we see radical-type behavior by Allah believing Muslims in the ME is directed almost exclusively against non-Muslims, between Muslim sects, or against apostates. All other violence is simply labeled ‘crime’, or else, as in the case of Israel, ‘redress of grievance’. If you factor that part of this crime and redress that which looks suspiciously identical to the ‘radical Muslim violence’ we accuse them of here, the levels are roughly equal. So, if Dinesh is buying this ‘Muslim radicals only in the West’ nonsense, it can only be he has bought into the CAIR propaganda there is no Muslim violence in the ME, and no comparable radicalism of any kind; which is true but only because suppressed. Muslim Apostates are sometimes dealt with by mobs with the sanction of ruling councils. Iraq lies on a fault-line between Sunni Baghdad and Shia Iran. This Sunni-Shia schism is the main exception to the general rule Muslims may not fight fellow Muslims, which Islam makes as its claim for ‘religion of peace’. The other places we find Muslim ‘radicalism’ are Israel, Sudan, India, the Balkans, Philippines, and anywhere Muslims come in contact with non-Muslims. Thirty years ago we had a brief spate of religious uprisings forcing ‘secular’ Muslim governments like those of Egypt to reform in greater conformity with shari’a; but, nonetheless, left some of these governments intact, possibly giving rise to the western notion the chief problem was/is not with liberalism. The notion Muslim radicalism is somehow created by liberalism’s corrosive influence and because these radicals are mostly liberal is extremely weak. In fact, it is on life support. The real problem with Islam is that any credo that challenges Islam’s core tenet of submission is a threat. It is a threat, because it is an unnatural belief for people to have of themselves and, therefore, an idea needing constant reinforcing if it is to be maintained. What we regard as radicalism in Muslims, then, is simply deeply religious, easily threatened Muslims reacting to rival philosophies with which they come in contact and fanned by their mullahs into translating belief into action. This is mistaking behavior for ideology. Radical-Islam (or, perhaps, we should call it ‘hardcore-traditional Islam’) borrows strategy and tactics from radical-liberalism, but is not itself liberal.
Around the globe, the spread of the liberal idea resulted in initial (radical) demands for greater freedom, tolerance, better treatment, and prosperity. Briefly, that happened in parts of the world under Muslim rule; but, almost immediately, movements sprung up in resistance to liberal ideas in widely separated places; and the principal irritation in all such cases was the inherent threat of free-will to Islam and Muslim rule. Some of these movements were initiated from above (from the mullahs, imams, and sheiks who direct the course of official Islam), but also from the ground up (from traditionalists recognizing in liberalism the threat to the very essence of what it means to be a Muslim – surrendering totally to Allah). They foresaw fellow Muslims enticed by freedom to the neglect of religion and reacted to that. Many of these movements were begun by religious scholars and students, or by zealots co-opting the teachings of scholars. Among the former was Wahhabism; among the latter and far more widespread are movements like the Muslim Brotherhood, Islamic Jihad, and Qutbism.
I’m sorry, but “… find almost anything in the Koran – as you can in the Bible” is an argument almost as old as slogans. That doesn’t make it accurate. There is no interpretation anyone but an idiot can put on the New Testament that it condones religiously inspired violence. It could be put on the Old Testament, but not to the degree it can be used to justify global religious domination. Where it does appear is in the Jewish re-conquest of tribal lands lost while in Egyptian captivity, and applies only to those lands. The justification used was those lands were specifically promised by G-d to Abraham and Israel to their descendants for all time. That’s it. Where Jesus spoke of violence, it was to teach peace. Both Jesus and Paul spoke eloquently and unambiguously against such justifications, whether in defense of religion or states. Yes, his was a continuation of the ‘old religion’, but he radically altered the terms of that religion from then forward. We Jews do not accept Jesus as a god the way Christians do (on the Greek model of deifying kings), but that does not mean we do not revere the lessons he taught the world. Many have tried to torture his meaning to find justification for their religious wars, but every such attempt is trumped by overwhelming scriptural confirmation of this core Christian belief in nonviolence. Therefore, whenever Christian zealots took to fighting anyway, they were not acting in accord with Christ’s message. They were acting in accord with some other motivation and scouring scripture to give them legitimacy. You don’t have to look anywhere near that hard finding it in the Koran or Hadith. Nor was this change confined to Christianity because Judaism suffered a mass exodus of converts to the new religion forcing it to change also. We incorporated the peace of Jesus into later compilations, enshrining it as deeply as other tenets of our religion. Judaism’s great idea was freedom in religion, Christianity’s great idea was peace built on the love of men for each other. For several centuries this new paradigm held and the Roman world saw a measurable decrease in the number and ferocity of conflicts. The only significant threat to peace in this period arose out of the territorial aspirations of Persia and Byzantium of which Western Europe and large parts of north Africa played little part. Other squabbles were petty, local, and territorial.
Then, in the seventh century, a new and aggressive religion erupted out of Arabia, butchering and pillaging in the name of Allah, destabilizing the peace of Rome and the hegemonies of Byzantium and Persia, and weakening the resolve of Christians to act Christian. Europe learned again how to fight and, in the process incorporated much of the new religion’s scriptural ideology as well as its more successful martial methods and techniques for governance.
Unlike Jesus, Mohammed was not a teacher of peace but of war for the advancement of his god and personal glory, incidentally accruing considerable power and perks to himself. His successors continued spreading his religion (mainly by means of war, reduction in status, and threats of death), pillaging, and massacring those unfit to serve them as slaves, and laying waste to large tracts that took centuries to recover (some never have because of the indifference that rigidly imposed Islam induces, lack of freedom does that to people).
There is nothing dubious in my interpretation of the Koran. It is the interpretation hardcore, unapologetic Muslims give it, and which very few ‘moderate’ Muslims bother denying. If this is just some ‘dubious interpretation I picked up’, why aren’t Islamic scholars rushing to defend it. They don’t because the evidence is available to us and has a nasty habit of putting their religion in bad odor the more it is revealed. Until the 19th century with the triumph of liberalism, Muslim chroniclers delighted in publishing the exploits of a patron sheik in whose service they fawned. These chroniclers detailed a trail of blood a mile wide and spanning three continents for us to read of infidel deaths measured in the tens and hundreds of thousands, year after year and century after century. Since that time and because Islam fell on hard times and disrepute, a different spin has been put on Islam to dispel the odor and making it more acceptable to post-modern sensibilities. I have no doubt a great many modern Muslims accept this spin as gospel, but the undeniable record of Islam is and remains a long succession of religious military campaigns waged in the name of Allah without remorse and in which rival religion is suppressed, spoils and slaves are divvied up, and against which the thirst for freedom has proved a major obstacle in the way of restoring it to former glory. European Christian history may not bear scrutiny all that much better, but it is false putting very much of the blame for that on your religion; a religion which, if anything, tempered European aggression relative to Muslim aggression, and more so the more it is understood and valued.
Anthropological arguments are attempts to equate unequal things in the belief we can reduce all things ‘scientifically’. To be accurate they are far more useful for understanding ourselves (a subject we can get our brains around) than understanding others. This is because they start from 'us' rather than from where we ought be looking to understand 'them' which is them. Understanding 'them' is always much harder and, so, we resort to anthropologic shortcuts. These type arguments have always suffered massively from the tendency of humans to project our own values onto others to satisfy an innate desire to be liked. No sooner is one of these arguments made then it is pounced on as the solution to every social problem or disagreement that is far more easily understood on its own terms. We don’t need fancy, vague, feel-good anthropological arguments to understand Islam or its angst.
You missed my point regarding pornography entirely which was Islam is no more the source of pornography than we are and, conversely, we are no more or less to blame. Pornography is as old as cave paintings and found in every culture. My point is we have nothing to apologize to Muslims (or anyone else for that matter) for having allowed our own idiots the freedom to express themselves in this regard. There are websites in some Muslim countries that pander to vice every bit as much as ours do, and their misuse of the Internet started around the same time. It is only in the more rigid Muslim countries where it has been successfully suppressed; yet, even there, human weakness somehow prevails. Our culpability is limited to the fact we built the networks. But that is like blaming Henry Ford because people do stupid things while driving cars. Calling us the source of the problems, then, is just scapegoating.
Every culture on the planet has the “institution of the family”. The Russians are very big into family and always have been. That did not keep them from embracing a murderous ideology did it? Were they any less into family because they were commies? How about the drug cartels? They are very big into families too. Does that mean we share a similar worldview or should relax and forget they are flooding our country with dangerous substances targeting mainly children? No other cultural or religion on earth condones its children being used as bombs or human-shields as does Islam. Nor is this a new phenomenon. The term ‘assassin’ (hashshashin) derives from an ancient Persian Muslim sect that acquired children (usually abducted) which they then drugged with hashish and brainwashed as human weapons. They preferred children because it is harder convincing adults into suicidal attacks. The Ottomans did much the same with Janissaries which were taken as children from mostly Christian families and raised to become soldiers fighting other Christians and pagans. Please tell me how Dinesh reconciles the love these people have for their children (which is real enough) with using these same children as weapons in all its religious wars, and how we should then 'relate to that'.
Islam is not that hard to understand. It began as the pseudo-religion of a delusional misfit who desperately wanted respect. He borrowed ideas from Jewish, Christian and Persian visitors as well as from local tribal religions, all of which he managed to mangle rather badly in translation, and went about preaching to anyone who would listen. Apparently, he was pretty insufferable about it and, although he managed to gather a small following, was thrown out for his troublemaking; and felt humiliated and unappreciated. So, he plotted revenge against his former Meccan neighbors and uncles, preached his religion (fortified with promises of plunder) to a bunch of sand-pirates, plundered and murdered Meccan (and other) caravans, modified his religious narrative to cover his altered tactics, made up stories about his enemies, built up a following strong enough to take the Meccans head on and ultimately defeat them, and eliminated rivals and anyone the least threatening to his sanctimonious authority. Along the way, he built up a myth of invincibility he used to encourage his warriors and used his direct personal relation with Allah to keep them in line. He also kept the best plunder for himself as ‘most worthy’, and made up special rules (e.g., unlimited wives for himself) applying to him alone for all time straight from Allah’s mouth to his ear. He arbitrated for himself the position of final and only spokesman to insure no one could ever take his place then or later.
Fortunately for his legacy, he died before he could do much to blow his cover. His henchmen then took turns assuming the mantle and polishing the record the better to keep power. About a hundred years after Mohammed’s death, some serious theologians got hold of Islam and turned it into the more sophisticated religion we know; and, so, it remained until forced by modernity and overexposure into reducing the emphasis on things like jihad and plunder. One of the things those early theologians did was change the order of the text, putting increased emphasis on spiritual duties but doing nothing to reduce the priority Mohammed and those first caliphs placed on expanding Islam’s reach by conquest. For awhile, there were multiple versions of the Koran floating around, but someone in authority realized that wouldn’t do and had all but one version suppressed. They may also have taken some ‘poetic license’ with Mohammed’s prose because there is little evidence he had a literary background or naturally poetic inclination (do know he could write and be persuasive, but poetry probably wouldn’t have worked on his sand-pirates). True believers, of course, insist the words and poetry are Allah’s, which, of course, is entirely possible but I can’t see the Creator would choose such a one as Mohammed as representative. Those ‘peaceful’ poetic passages we see in the Koran and placed toward the end were putatively written entirely during Mohammed’s Meccan period before he got thrown out and at a time he was trying to win converts with honey, and following the script that seemed to work so well for those other more successful religions. The bloodthirsty parts he wrote later on to justify multiple massacres and convinced of his own sanctity, and, so are out of chronological order in the final product.
My response does not equate liberalism with “far-left, anti-family values”. I am using liberalism in the context of ‘classic-liberalism’ which is nothing like the modern spin we give the term ‘liberalism’. Islam despises secularism because it supposes itself the champion of religion, but hates freedom because freedom blows its cover and stands in the way of its ultimate object – total domination of human society and religious thought. You are trying to understand Islam’s animosity with the West in Western terms, and I am pretty sure that is neither possible nor relevant. Islam can be more easily understood and dealt with as a shaky proposition whose adherents are desperately preventing it falling apart and who see us as causing that to happen. We went through much the same thing with communism and much the same ‘anthropological’ arguments were bandied both trying to make sense of that nonsense and lending it cover.
Of course, I could be all wrong or inhabiting another universe where good is bad and bad is lavender. ;-)
I want you to know I am really enjoying this exchange and that we are covering so much ground that needs covering. Luminous ball is entitled to his point and I won't disagree with him we have made some mistakes, but it doesn't help getting stuck in rant and he is not going to get very far insisting on painting things blacker than reality warrants.
Bob,
I think you should read D'Souza's book !
1) To the question of Wahhabi Islam, you'll have to read his evidence. Do the main schools of Wahhabi advocate attacking the west? This is an empirical question and may be resolved easily.
2) I disagree w/ your monolithic characterization of "Islamic" societies as such. This was why I made the passing reference to many Islamic societies as having a variety of governments and degrees of adherence to Islam. Iran today is very different from what it was in much of the 20th century, and Syria, Turkey and Iraq have secular governments. THe PLO was always wholly secular. Lebanon until 1975 was probably as decadent a place as you'd find in Middle East. All of these societies had significant Marxist movements. For complex reasons, an extreme Islamic group took over in Iran in 1979–but it is generally despised by its citizens for precisely this reason. Up until this time, most historians paid less attention to religion that other features of ME societies. Most historians would have argued that "lack of freedom" in these countries had less to do with religion than the dictatorships that ruled them. My point is that you are using an "intellectual historical" point in the distant past to perhaps avoid these more contemporary complexities.
3. I'm not sure arguing that one holy book is better than antoher holy book gets us very far. While all of us have interpretations of the scriptures (Islamic and Christian), St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas are very clear in their support of forced conversion and Holy War. ONe might argue both are wrong, but we are trying to "clear" one faith vis a vis the other when it comes to violence, both speak for a majority of Christians. . .
4. I tried to avoid a debate over "what the HOly texts 'really' mean" by declaring them both "poetic" texts, ie. both contain contradictions and so their followers are free to say whatever they will about them (ie. they are of peace, or war)I'm making no claim about the "truth" of the Bible or the Koran in my review.
5. I don't understand your criticism of "anthopological" points. I think D'Souza makes a simple, very elementary one: Western societies used to value the family. Muslim societies continue to value the family. Muslims today are angry because western societies are now trying to attack their core institution. This strikes me as common sense! I call it "anthropological" because he's using the family in a sort of "trans-political" sense, ie. he's saying "pay less attention to what the ayatollahs say about us–pay attention to what we have at core in common w/ the Iranian (or Saudi) people!
6. I actually didn't miss the point on pornography. –and here the issue may easily be resolved empirically! There is one source of the world's pornography, and it's here in the USA! In fact much of what we call "prime time" TV is pornogrpahy in the rest of the world–and not just among the Muslims. However, D'Souza's point here is an esp. good oen. While you refer to "idiots" amongst us who take advantage of our freedom, D"Souza argues it's no longer enough to simply call them "idiots." There are now–not of course in the good ole US of A– consequences! The Islamic world, he argues, will no longer let us hide behind "Freedome of speech." What are we gonna do about it?! Continue to hide? Call Allen Dershowitz to protect us? Point out to Bin Laden teh "penumbra" in the (US) constitution that gives us the right to show his daughter "snuff films"? D'Souza is simply giving us a challenge!
7. D'Souza's point about the media in America being anti-family hardly needs to be disputed. That the "media" in the Islamic world is quite different also hardly can be disputed. His point is that the two are different because they reflect different values in different societies. This I find convincing.
8. (conclusion) I'm not seeing why it is so difficult to see the current American and European assault on the traditional family as provocative to the Islamic (and the rest of the, for that matter) world. However, I also find –from personal experience in part–that most people simply want to work, raise their families and go about their business. I find no reason to imagine the Islamic world–at the level of hte common citizen–is radically different. Most Christians today dont' organize their lives around the passages St. AUgustine and Aquinas thought authroized holy war–why should we assume most Muslims treat the Koran the same way?
I think there are some serious problems w/ D'Souza's argument–and Sullivan puts his finger on the main one, which is philosophical. However Sullivan takes refuge in western political philosohpy and in the name of "freedom of expression"–any freedom of expression– is willing to put the entire Islamic world to the sword. (mainly over the issue of homosexuality)D'Souza suggests we find a way to clean up the worst offenses of liberalism–namely the elite attacks on the family, or run the threat of further antagonizing the Muslims. Are you willing to take on the entire Islamic world so that "baywatch" can be streamed into every Islamic household? After all, it's a matter of "freedom of speech.?"
WNA
In re-reading this, I wish to make one addition/concession before someone else gets the idea. This is with respect to your "institution of family". We too are to be criticised for our abuse of children. Where some Muslims abuse theirs as bombs, many Westerners gladly abort ours. This still does not answer how 'shared family values' will bridge the divide of understanding, especially if couched in false and self-flattering terms. I don't understand how fellow Westerners can bring themselves to abort a child, so it is probable there are as many Muslims perplexed by fellow Muslim's casual disregard for a child's life. However, that is still not the same as a religion that has made a cult of killing fellow humans primarly over religion, which makes Islam closer to liberal-socialism than Judeo-Christianity or classic-liberalism in this regard.
Tell you what Nathan, I'll promise to read yours (mean to anyway) if you'll read mine then reconvene to compare notes. What do you say?
By the bye, I am not arguing these things you find offensive to Muslim sensibilities are not in some degree offensive. Heck, I find them offensive so why shouldn't they. But, they are more our problem to deal with and no more a threat to Islam than is, say, sumo-wrestling and geishas. Why then the emphasis on Western foibles. Japanese is no threat to Islam at present and, so, no reason to find lame excuses other than the real reason which if generally known would put Islam in worse oder.
Radical-Islam's real problem is our culture of freedom. Blasting to the world they are offended by freedom and seeking to end it makes them more enemies than friends. Attacking our lax morals, on the other hand, garners them support from a broad section in agreement with that sentiment if not the conclusion it warrants flying planes into our buildings. Clearly, then the emphasis on lax morals infringing on Muslim morals is more in the way of a distraction.
Best regards, Bob
Nathan,
Muslim resistance and hostility to liberalism predates Hollywood and the Internet by more than a century. The salafist movements the modern radical movements evolved from got rolling in the mid-19th century well before the issue of who has more porno could have been germane. The old anti-imperialist rant back then was the reason given. The old-imperialist are laid to rest (though it doesn't seem to register with ideologues; and if you dig them up and give 'em a good kick they jiggle like they're still kicking), yet the seething hatred of the liberal West persists. Different eras, different excuses, same resentment.
Nathan,
There are as many sources of pornography as there is interest in it. That is a human failing, not a uniquely American failing. Much of that pornography showing up as spam in your email is making the rounds as much outside Western countries as within (we don't really own the net or control content). A huge amount of it comes from Asia and Africa. There is a lot of it coming from Russia and about the same from South America, Mexico and the Caribbean. Haven't you noticed that when you do an information query, what pops up first are nearby sources and the farther away sources are pages away. If you search on porn in China what pops up first then will be Chinese sourced porn and what pops up here will be primarily local porn. This is just a programming search trick embedded in the software to make what pops up relevant to each searcher. Net traffic reduction in the software also plays a role. Reaching half a planet away to find something available locally takes longer and uses more resources. Therefore, you can't take the prevalence of an American porn query launched from an American computer as an indication we produce more of this stuff than anyone else. Once again, I think you are confuting the folks who built the highway with how it is used.
Our Hollywood and television is a different matter, but if these other countries you reference have less smut in their comparable media, it is only because they censor content more than we do, not because their raging bulls are any less piqued or contributory than ours. My experience of this is censorship only succeeds in driving it underground and creating blackmarkets, but does not significantly suppress it (though severe punishment like castration does). Therefore, if Bollywood is sanitized more than Hollywood, it means their underground sex emporiums are thriving.
Bob!
My comment was only that you should probably read the book! It's not a great book–my summary is a very streamlined account of what is put forth very sloppily.
1. I think it's hard to argue that Americans or westerners in general value the family remotely as much as do Muslims. We accept passively Hollywood's continuous degredation of the family and religion. One might argue that its' the authoritarian nature of Islamic society that forbids criticism of the family–Muslims might argue they prefer it this way!
2. I think the key issue D'Souza would have w/ your comment #10 is "our freedom." Unfort. the globe is truly international when it comes to culture–we can no longer hide behind our oceans! And while we protect the right to pornography w/in our own borders, it quickly finds its way into other cultures, much like cocaine finds its way here from Colombia. D'Souza might say, how do they stop pornography from coming into the Islamic world? Do they educate their population? Or do they take more drastic measures. He suggests the latter. However, the more interesting question is whether there might be another outcome, if we could clean up our own act. Does suppressing one bit of smut somehow compromise our "Liberalism"?
3. rEGARDING Pt. 11. D'Souza argues–w/ evidence taken from speeches among other things–that the Muslim radicals today focus on "western decadence" as being a reason for Jihad. He's addressing a contemporary irritation–not one that has necessarily been around indefiniitely.
4. I disagree w/ you on the origins of smut! THE US is w/o question the place par excellence–and more importantly, enthusiastically (as far as the law is concerned) advertises thsi freedom. The relevant point is, however, that Muslims identify it as something coming from America (wether this is true or not).
The main points I wanted to emphasize from D'Souza's book was:
1) Muslims identify certain forms of western cultural expression as extremely offensive–namely pornography that attacks the family.
2) Most Americans disapprove–even strongly–of this pornography.
3) Rather than protect this anti-family pornography–and incurring the wrath of the Muslims–would it not be better to prevent it at home, thus not angering our Muslim neighbors and possibly strengthening the family at home?
Best,
WNA
Nathan,
With regard to your item #4, Post-13 above you said “I disagree w/ you on the origins of smut! THE US is w/o question the place par excellence–and more importantly, enthusiastically (as far as the law is concerned) advertises this freedom. The relevant point is, however, that Muslims identify it as something coming from America (whether this is true or not).”
What you are arguing here is: myth creates its own reality, and there is some truth in that. I agree with you Muslim anti-Western, anti-liberal myths play a part in this angst, but cannot have been the originating motivation behind these movements, and are insufficient on their own to sustain hatred and suspicion for the many decades salafist-jihadists have been at our throats. What all of these movements have in common and teach is hatred of rivals and rival creeds. Moral dissolution is exploited by salafists more as symptomatic illustration for why our particular creed (liberalism) is evil than as a reason to attack us (not the real threat). Nor is it the only attribute of liberal societies which they exploit. They have, thus far, railed against us for our: political chaos, civic efficiency, greed, generosity, technology, strength, weakness, art (characterized as decadent even when not), literature, music, ignorance, learning, efficiency, inefficiency, sophistication, inexperience, decadence, innocence, rashness, and caution (some of these despite they crave them also). Each has been thrown in the stew at different times to see which will float while supporting the underlying objection against freedom. The narrative has varied, but the thrust and hatred has remained pretty solid.
Another thing obscuring this picture is not all of the arguments salifist level against us are their own. An awful lot of what you have been acknowledging as valid Muslim angst, is stuff they picked up from us arguing among ourselves alternate reasons for their hatred of us (very circular and exactly as D’Sousa has been doing). It doesn’t take much to figure out if your enemy is given to criticizing himself, his own arguments will not only be useful in expanding your own (theirs), but will also be the more easily digested by us when played back as though true. This makes it much easy for jihadist to tie us in knots second-guessing them. At the same time, it picks up a life of its own in which the next-generation of jihadists believes it and takes it as their point of entry into the debate, even when it is patently false from simple observation of their own society and its failures. So, to that degree, what you say is valid; but also invalid because in so arguing you create/propagate the myth and draw all of us (and them) further from the root conflict. It is not enough finding things that irritate them; whatever it is driving them to fanatical measures must actually threaten them and their power. Anything less is just smoke.
I have begun reading D’Sousa’s book, but already I am getting a sense he was intent on debunking the left’s argument we caused 9/11 with our ‘imperialist meddling’ than he is of finding the real reason for Muslim hate, and is doing this by shifting blame for it onto ‘leftist immorality’. If that is the case, then he’s just playing their game back at them (the left) and hasn’t given serious consideration to the question whether or not this has anything to do with us or, if with us, our role is sufficiently blameworthy or relevant to solving the jihadist dilemma. Both these arguments have as predicate that: if we are the cause, then we must be the solution. Yet, neither comes close to doing any such thing. Can D’Sousa really imagine if we simply clean up our American stable all this jihadist nonsense will vanish? Rubbish! At the end of the day, we have to ask if our part is even something we want to change or if it makes greater sense they (jihadist) should be the ones to change. As theirs is the far greater immorality (religious murder of innocents and dragging us back toward slavery), it is they who need to get off their holier-than-thou nonsense and leave us alone. Then, and only then, can we can talk about cleaning up this other stuff (a problem we all have) together.
I will have more as I read the book, but wanted to get these thoughts down while fresh.
One other quick note. We are not the most prolific producers of smut, as you believe us, nor is ours qualitatively worse that that of others. What evidence do you have other than the 'common wisdom' Hollywood and television are worse than any other. I was watching a BBC production called “Spooks” the other night, that made our comparable programs seem positively tame in the ‘flesh’ department (the British are far more comfortable showing that kind of thing on TV than we are). It was not that long ago that ‘French’ was synonymous with lewd and ‘American’ with naiveté. Before that and going back a few centuries, it was the Italians and (yep) the Ottomans (read Shakespeare), before that the Chinese, Indians (Kama Sutra), Romans (bacchanalia), Greeks (naked wrestling, theater, epic rapes), Persians, Sodomites, Moabites … in fact pretty much everybody gets accused of it. Even today, the Dutch openly put flesh on display for purchase on main-street whereas we keep it to back alleys and gin joints. It was the Japanese who first created highly-perverse, Internet-based sexual art (manga and anime), and still lead the pack in that division I gather. When I lived in California, it was common knowledge Tijuana and other Mexican border towns catered to host of vices still not to be found (or not easily) on our leftist coast. The Japanese are likewise renowned for their group business junkets to the sex parlors of Thailand, Hong Kong, Ho Chi Min City and anyone else who will host them. So, no, I am not seeing we are the best or worst in this regard. I think the reputation is undeserved; and, like the ‘why do Muslims hate us’ angst, best described as a ‘circular firing squad’ and mostly ‘self-inflicted’.
I think I've summarized D'Souza's argument as best I can and I think at this point I'm repeating myself. I think Sullivan makes strong objections to D'Souza– though I"ll deal with them in my review of his book (and his piece on D'Souza).
I'm no expert on the pornography industry, but I'd be hard pressed to believe that US capitalism and California liberalism are being outperformed in this dept. by even the most outrageous of French publishing houses! But I'll leave it at that. Finally, as I mentioned before, D'Souza's explanation is fully compatable w/ arguing that Muslim outrage ALSO has religious roots. All he does is make the causality a bit more "contemporary" with our own experience ofoutrage.
WNA